Becton Dickinson Gets EUA for At-Home COVID-19 Antigen Test Providing Results by Phone

At-home rapid SARS-CoV-2 antigen testing has become a gold mine. Expanding availability, affordability and use of those tests is a central element of President Biden’s new COVID-19 response plan. The administration will purchase nearly $2 billion worth of these tests—280 million total tests—from multiple manufacturers. And now comes word of what could be a product game changer. In late August, Franklin Lakes, NJ-based Becton Dickinson (BD) announced in late August, that its BD Veritor At-Home COVID-19 Test using computer vision technology in a smartphone to interpret and provide a digital display of COVID-19 testing results has received Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) from the FDA.

The Veritor Test

The BD Veritor Test, which doesn’t require a prescription, uses a nasal swab and a mobile app from Scanwell Health that can yield test results in as soon as 15 minutes. The app is available on iOS and Android and provides step-by-step instructions on how to collect and transfer the nasal swab sample to the test stick. The mobile device’s camera is then used to capture, analyze and interpret the results, which eliminates the human subjectivity of a visually read test.

BD says its test is designed to be easily performed at home by people 14 years of age or older. The test can also be used for children as young as two-years-old with samples collected by an adult.

BD will initially make the test available to businesses, schools and governments looking to provide a self-testing option for employees or students.

“The rise in COVID-19 cases from the Delta variant has increased the demand for at-home testing, and the BD Veritor At-Home COVID-19 Test is an easy-to-use test with definitive digital results that is ideal for use in the home,” noted Dave Hickey, BD president of Life Sciences in a press release. “New mandates from governments and businesses are specifying the need for periodic testing for those who cannot or chose not to be vaccinated, and this new test may help businesses, governments or schools fulfill those requirements,” he added.